Beda
by Rachel DeFausse
Summary: This is the story of my Dark/Dark defender character on City of Heroes. I look forward to any feedback.
1. Chapter 1: Dark Beginings

Beda's Tale: Part One

Dark Beginings

By: Rachel DeFausse

King's Row isn't exactly the prettiest place in the world. Between the Circle of Thorns cult grabbing people for rituals of human sacrifice and the Dr. Frankenstein wannabes trying to hack up unsuspecting citizens as spare parts for their horrific experiments, I find it amazing that anyone makes it more than a week in this section of Paragon city.

As for me, being born and raised in the Row meant I had to learn quick how to survive. More than just surviving though, I learned what it took to. The link seemed obvious to me. In King's Row you were either predator or you were prey, the distinction separating the two seemed equally obvious, predators ran in packs while prey were picked off traveling alone.

The solution to my survival was a simple matter of becoming part of the right group and finding safety in numbers.

I made my choice; I was going to throw in with the Skulls. The Skulls ran most of the Row from what I had seen, they had the numbers and unlike some other groups, like the Outcasts, they were willing to take just about anyone who was interested not just those showing potential for developing powers.

I did have one issue to overcome however, the Skulls weren't exactly known for gender equality. Usually the only women to be seen around Skulls members were their air-headed girlfriends women usually too into their own looks to realize the mayhem their boyfriends were up to. That definitely wasn't me.

I had done my homework and I had found out that the Skulls initiation wasn't that complicated a process. If someone was interested in being a Skull they went to one of the leaders and were given a target, usually someone from a rival gang or a person who had caused the gang trouble before.

If I had gone to a Skulls leader with the desire to join, no doubt I would have been laughed out of the room simply because I wasn't one of the guys. I knew what I had to do.

Everyone in Paragon knew the Skulls' main rivals were the Hellions. As I took the butcher knife from the chopping block I justified my plan with the thought that by doing it this way I was not only earning my own safety among the Skulls but by taking a Hellion off the streets I was saving the lives of that Hellion's future victims.

The surprise in Skelter's eyes when I dropped a bloodstained Hellion jacket at his feet was clearly visible even through his mask. I knew at that instant I was in.

Still that thought was little solace for the grief that would haunt me afterwards. Every time I closed my eyes I would see the agony on that Hellions face and wake only to cry myself back to sleep hours later.

Skelter accompanied the small group personally when I was taken to a nearby graveyard to get the mask that would finalize my admittance to the gang. It seemed that he was taking an active interest in his new "proactive" recruit.

I had always thought the masks the Skulls wore were realistically made plastic or ceramic simulations. Tonight I was to learn just how authentic they were as I acquired my own. It was disgusting, but my new mask was the final symbol of my acceptance into the Skulls and the protection they offered.

Skelter and I spent a lot of time together after that. I knew he didn't love me, I doubted he was even capable of the emotion, but truth be told I didn't love him either. To him I was a interesting little oddity, a toy to be played with and discarded, to me he was extra security, not only was I a Skull now but I was the girlfriend of one of the Skulls' better known bosses.

I had my spot in the gang, but it turned out be more work than I had expected. Getting in was one thing, maintaining my spot was another.

I volunteered for most of the robberies, doing so gave the illusion that I was exited about committing the crimes while at the same time people didn't take as much notice when I passed on the more violent endeavors.

Between my seemingly high self-motivation, being a female member of the gang and being an item with Skelter, my reputation grew faster than I was comfortable with. It took only six months before I was promoted to the rank of Death's Head, and three months after that when Skelter came to me with news I hadn't ever expected to hear.

"There are some people that want to meet you," he said in his usual emotionless tones as he came through the door.

"Again?" I sighed. I had become a bit of an attraction for new Skulls and members from other cells that were in the area.

"It ain't like that," Skelter stated flatly, "The Petrovics want to meet you. I'm to bring you to them next Saturday."

"The…the.." I stammered like a busted recording. The Petrovic brothers were the founders of the Skulls and they only saw people for two reasons, promotion or demotion, and demotion was the more common, and usually fatal, option.

"Relax," Skelter breathed in my ear as he came up behind me, "They are offering you a promotion and your own cell to lead. Your goanna be a Bone Daddy, or I guess Bone Mamma in your case."

My knees felt weak, I had sought security when I joined the Skulls and being a Bone Daddy was about as secure as you could get, not only would I have an entire cell of Skulls between me and anyone else, but I had seen Skelter summon up shadowy tendrils of power and knew that ability offered even more protection for me. Besides, even if I didn't want it, the Petrovics weren't people you said no to when they made you an offer.

Four days later I was brought into a ritual chamber. It was a dark catacomb beneath the same cemetery where Skelter had taken me to get my skull mask. Eyeless sockets glared at me from the bodies laid out on ledges along the walls of the tunnels. It was almost as if they were judging me for being a part of this. Or in hind sight, maybe they were trying to warn me back from the course I was on. If so, I should have taken that warning to heart and ran.

The Petrovic brothers were there, sitting like royalty in thrones made from human bones, and I had to swallow down my nervousness. These men were the founders of the gang. Street talk was they had even killed their own parents, burning the building down they were living in. And that was before taking the names Marrow Snap and Marrow Drinker when they started the Skulls.

Even with their death masks on you could tell they were brothers. Both were tall and muscular, both had sandy blonde hair, and both had the same look in their eyes, a look that held no emotion as they regarded me like I was just a fly to be swatted.

"Skelter," one of the brothers nodded at my escort as he spoke in an accent that reminded me of Béla Lugosi in that old-time Dracula movie, "You have brought us the gift we requested?"

"Yes my lord, Marrow Snap," Skelter kept his eyes on the floor as he spoke to the gang founders. It was the first time I had ever seen him defer to anyone, usually he was the on who made people cower.

"And has she done those things that we required?" The other brother asked.

"She took life the first day I met her, lord Marrow Drinker," Skelter answered timidly, "In the year since she has offered herself to any task we have assigned, without fail."

"Has she any personal ties?" The first brother, who I now knew as Marrow Snap asked Skelter. Part of me was offended at not being spoken too directly, but the other half was glad that, even though I was the topic of the conversation, I was not the focus of the brothers' attention.

"All of her ties beyond us have been severed, Lord Marrow Snap." Skelter knew I had been raised in the King's Row orphanage after my parents had died in the Rikti War. No one wanted to adopt a fourteen year old though. Everyone wanted the little babies that they could watch learn how to walk and talk.

Marrow Drinker stood slowly and with an air of command, "Then bring her forth that she may shed her mortal bonds and be reborn as a vessel of death."

"Relax," Skelter whispered to me as we moved forward, "The pain won't last long and the power you will command afterwards is well worth it."

The Petrovic brothers stood on either side of me and I felt like a rat caught between a tiger and a lion. They raised their hands in a slow synchronous movement and began to release tendrils of darkness from the tips of their fingers.

It was like the dark blasts that I had seen Skelter harness and hurl at those who opposed him, except these moves slower, creeping towards me through the air like black snakes.

I closed my eyes. This was the key to getting the power I needed. This was the way to become strong enough that I would never have to rely on someone else for protection. I waited for it, taking a small solace in Skelter's promise that the pain wouldn't last long.

I learned a few heartbeats later…Skelter lied.

Pure darkness was forcing its way into my body. I could feel it in my eyes, cold as ice yet burning in a way that would have made pepper spray feel like saline drops in comparison, my throat filled with it to the point that I gagged wanting nothing more than to vomit it back out but I couldn't. Rhythmic chanting from the Petrovic brothers was lost somewhere in the background as the darkness forced its way into my ears.

The feelings were nothing however in comparison to what I saw. As the darkness entered me it brought with it visions of where it was coming from. I was shown visions of death and decay, of destruction pain and tortured souls. Some call it the netherworld, others say it's the void, and still others call it the abyss, I call it hell.

All the while the darkness was inside of me, ripping at my very soul. It was as if there wasn't enough room in my body for it so it was trying to destroy the very essence of what was me. It tore at every good thought I ever had as if my memories were just scraps of paper to be shredded as discarded.

I don't know what I had lost to it before I finally began resisting the darkness, but I do know when I began to fight back.

The darkness reached the memories of my parents. Memories of birthday parties, and learning to ride a bicycle felt its first touches and as it began its attempt at tearing these thoughts from me I sould feel it touch the fond memory of my parents smiles and I screamed.

Or at least I thought I screamed. The darkness had filled my throat and lungs and I doubt anything came out, but in my mind, heart and soul I screamed like a banshee.

I fought back in my mind with all the willpower I could muster. The very essence of what it meant to be human was being torn away from me and destroyed, but I was protecting it for all I was worth. No longer was I the mouse to be eaten by the great cats, I was now a wild beast, guarding my treasured memories like a mother bear defending her cubs.

At least until the stream of darkness flowing into me from the Petrovics finally came to an end and I passed out.

I awoke the next morning in my own room. I don't know how I got there. I presume Skelter took me home, but I don't think I'll ever know for sure.

I could feel something welling up in me. It felt like nausea at first, that stuck at the back of your throat feel you get right before you run for the toilet to vomit, but also something else, something deep in my being, something cold and dark.

My eyes must have gone wide as diner plates with the realization that came next. That darkness was still in me, it was like a slimy pool of ooze diluted throughout my whole being, except it was a living thing that had recently been fighting for dominance of my body, and it was hungry.

The door opened a minute later and Skelter was there with a young woman who, judging by her clothes and book-bag, was probably a first year student from the university over in Steel Canyon.

"I remember how I felt right after I changed," Skelter stated flatly as he pushed the woman into the room, "You need to feed."

I remember looking at the woman as she scampered across the dirty floor on her knees to cower in the corner. She looked completely helpless as she trembled in terror with tears streaking her cheeks.

I felt truly sorry for her, but part of me, that shadowy, dark, slimy part of me that had forced its way into me during the promotion ritual felt something completely different. It felt hunger; it wanted her in a way that was in part like and animal closing on wounded prey while partly it looked on her with a strange feeling akin to some sort of a twisted lust.

For an instant I could see myself in her. Not the woman I was, but the victim I had fought so hard not to become. I saw in her the fate I had strived to avoid for myself.

"No remorse," Skelter said as he slowly stepped in from the doorway, "You need to feed."

I looked on Skelter with new eyes. I had always thought that a violent life had taught him to be so cold and emotionless, but now I knew the truth, Skelter was what happened when the darkness was allowed full control of the human housing it. Everything he had held dear, every last thought or memory that had once given the man that became Skelter joy had been consumed and destroyed. Now, with no compassion or morality to guide him, everything around Skelter was just potential prey.

"The woman you were died last night," Skelter whispered to me from the doorway, "Dana Carols doesn't exist anymore. You are death incarnate. You are Beda now, goddess of the graves."

I wasn't sure how much of what was me remained and how much had been replaced by the dark pit that was gnawing at me from inside my own mind, but Skelter was right about one thing, I needed to feed badly. The longer I fought it back the stronger the desire got. I had to feed the darkness.

I struck out, releasing the hunger of the darkness, but I also struck with my rage. Rage that I had been subjected to the torment of that ritual, rage that I had been turned into the same type of monster that I had been seeking safety from, rage that Skelter thought I was the kind of beast he was and that I would feed on this poor innocent woman he had brought to me.

My anger fueled the darkness and I could feel it ride the currents of my emotions as it lashed out towards its intended victim. Not the victim that had been supplied to me, but the victim I had chosen in a blind desire for revenge.

My arms came up instinctively hurling bolts of pure darkness at Skelter with reckless abandon. I struck out at him time and again, each time the darkness would launch itself in balls of pure blackness streaming tendrils behind it like the ones the Petrovic's had emitted to change me, and each time that darkness would return, draining away portions of his life force and bringing them back to invigorate my own body.

Skelter was thrown against the wall by the force of my assault and as I vented my anger my attacks slowed and I watched as Skelter slumped down the wall unconscious. The darkness called for me to finish him off, but the part of me that was still me held back.

The darkness had been fed. It still hungered, but it had been sated enough that I could again rein it back and lock it deep in the hidden recesses of my soul for a time.

I dropped to my knees, tears welling in my eyes at what I had allowed myself to become. I knew the darkness would hunger again, and I knew I would have to feed it. I was a monster now. The type of hideous thing horror movies are written about.

Somewhere beyond my own tears, I heard the woman Skelter had brought thank me for saving her. I think I mumbled for her to go, I don't recall, but nonetheless she did go and I was glad of it.

I shattered my bone mask against the wall, no longer would I be a Skull, but somewhere deep inside me the darkness still lurked, and I knew it was only a matter of time before it would surface again. I would hold it back as long as I could, but when it grew hungry enough I knew without a doubt I would eventually have to give in and feed it.


	2. Chapter 2: Coming to Terms

Beda's Tale: Part Two

By: Rachel DeFausse

It had been three weeks.

It had been three weeks since I was put through that hellish ritual by the Petrovics. A ritual that opened gates to another world. A world where darkness isn't just the absence of light, but a living thing in its own right. A thing that flows like water, taking any shape it needs to feed itself. A thing that constantly seeks nothing more than its next prey.

It had been three weeks since I woke up with a portion of that darkness inside me, diluted through every fiber of my being. I could feel it everywhere. It was in my heart, making my blood pump faster in anticipation of hunting something to feed it. It was in my eyes, allowing me to see in the night as clearly as a great cat in the dark jungles. It was in my lungs, allowing me to use the air I breathed more efficiently so I would have the stamina to take down whatever prey I singled out for it.

Worst of all, it was in my head, lurking there every moment of every day. It was making me into the perfect predator and it was in my very mind prodding at me to use the abilities it was granting me to hunt for it. All the while it seemed frustrated that it had to prod in such a manner. It seemed to know that I was holding it back, that IT could be the controlling intelligence if it pushed hard enough and long enough. It seemed to sense that all it needed was a single moment of weakness, a moment in which it could force my mind to the background and bring itself to the front.

It had been three weeks since I lashed out at my former paramour, Skelter, with the powers that the darkness had granted me as its host. I had allowed the shadow powers to rip at his life to feed itself. I had allowed it to manifest as bolts of semisolid darkness as I hurled it at the man I had spent the previous half a year using as my personal protector within the ranks of the Skulls.

I had lashed at Skelter that night, not only with the hunger of the darkness that he had been there to see put in me, but also with a rage that he had been a part of letting that happen. Worse yet, that he had gone through it himself and KNEW what was going to happen to me.

As a "Bone Daddy" leader of the Skulls street-gang, Skelter had the same darkness harbored within him that I now had dwelling as a parasite within me. He had the same power to conjure it up as a weapon as I did. Truth is he probably had far more ability to do so than I did. Not only had he been at it longer, but he didn't try to resist it as I had.

Long ago, Skelter had either lost the battle against the darkness or, more likely, had given himself over to it willingly. I was still mostly me, my personality, my like my dislikes, but with the darkness lurking deep within while Skelter was almost fully the darkness, stripped of most emotion and feeling but with just enough of the hosts personality left over to allow that darkness an understanding of how out world worked and what ways would be best to feed itself.

I have little doubt that Skelter could have summoned up the darkness within him that night and killed me without so much as batting an eye if I hadn't caught him off guard with my assault.

In the three weeks since that night, I had begun to learn some of the many ways that being host to this darkness was altering me. I no longer slept more than two hours a night, for example, and my appearance had been changing as well.

While my hair had always been raven black, now it seemed to take on a different luster, like the deep black of well polished onyx jewelry. My skin was softer and hadn't the slightest blemish on it anywhere. My eyelashes were fuller, my lips a shade redder and even my bearing seemed to have improved. I walked taller and with the subtle grace of the hunter that it was trying to make me into.

Part of me, the part that was closest to the darkness in my mind, understood why it was doing this. The darkness wanted me to be more appealing, it wanted me to look as attractive as possible, and it wanted my looks to be so alluring that my very presence would serve as bait for the unsuspecting people on which it wanted to feed.

With the Bone Daddies of the Skulls the darkness seemed to create a look designed specifically to intimidate prey into submission, but with me it sought to attract its meals to their fates and disarm them from realizing there was any danger at all.

It had also given me the ability to live without needing food. Truth was, not only did I not need food any longer; I was physically incapable of eating regular meals anymore. I had tried, and while it looked and smelled good on my plate, the second the cheeseburger reached my lips the darkness in me touched it. The first bite rotted as it touched my tongue and had tasted as if it had spent a month sitting out on a counter gathering mold. I learned that the darkness had control over my actions in this respect at least. I think, perhaps, it didn't want me distracted from its hunger by hunger of my own.

And its hunger was strong. I had fought it back for these past three weeks and felt it grow all the while. I had felt the darkness in me look at the people I passed on the street like a starving man at an all-you-can-eat buffet. I even felt my mouth water a little once in reaction to its hunger within me, and it was then that I became a hermit in the truest sense.

I could not afford to lose control out on the streets where the darkness could lash out at anyone who happened to be convenient for it, so I went to the west side of King's Row. I knew from my time with the Skulls that the area held several abandoned warehouses, places the Skulls often used as safe houses. I also knew that the police had raided one about three months back and it would take quite a while before any of the local gangs would use it again.

Avoiding the warehouse was a pointless gesture in my opinion. My logic was the Paragon Police Department would know nobody would move back into it that quickly after a bust and I thought it highly unlikely that they would take an interest in it so soon after clearing it out either.

I went to the basement of the warehouse and reached out with the dark powers to collapse the ceiling over the doorway. I had shut myself in and planned to die there in my solitude, no doubt driven slowly mad by the darkness in me.

It was four days ago that I had sealed myself into that basement, and it was last night that I got out of it.

I don't know how I got out. I had nodded off for the bliss of those two hours a night that I can still sleep. Two hours a night that I could escape the hunger, even if it was only to the refuge of recurring nightmares.

The worst of my nightmares brought made me relive my worst memories of the recent past. In one, for example, I come out of the ritual of darkness without any part of my soul remaining and strike at Skelter from hunger rather than anger. As I raise my hand to deliver the final blow that would kill him the Hellion that I had killed to get the jacket that got me into the Skulls appears behind me and whispers that I should kill Skelter, that it's in my nature now and a killer is what I truly am.

It was from that dream that I awoke to find I was outside of my little self-made prison and kneeling on the landing of the fire-escape that ran up the side of my old apartment building. I was staring in a dirty window at sleeping form of my former upstairs neighbor, Mrs. Foster.

Mrs. Foster was an eighty-seven year old widow. Her daughter had married and moved away to raise children somewhere in the Midwest, Nebraska I think she said, and the son who had been taking care of her in her old age had been one of the many civilian casualties of the Circle of Thorns cult.

A part of me knew her as the sweet old lady who made sugar-cookies every Christmas for the whole building, but the other part saw her as a safe meal. She was a person with no connections close enough to force an investigation into what happened to her, and somehow I was sure that the darkness could kill her in a way that would have any but the most astute eye assuming that her age had simply gotten the better of her.

I found myself rationalizing it. I told myself that it would be ok to take a victim this old. That it wouldn't be as bad because she didn't have as much time left in her life as a younger target. I even remembered her arthritis and thought that I would be putting her out of her misery and doing her a favor.

All the while a thin string of drool was dribbling from the corner of my mouth and clouds of darkness were forming around me like the fog created by dry-ice at Halloween parties.

A small tendril of darkness reached towards the window and began to ooze through the gap between the lower pane and the skill. I saw it reaching for Mrs. Foster as she slept and I caught myself just in time, whipping it back into me as if it were a tight drawn rubber band that someone had released the other end of.

I ran most of that night and cried at the thought of what I had almost done. I thought I was running aimlessly, but I think part of me was seeking the safety of the little cell I had spent the last couple days in.

I got there just before dawn, but the door was still securely shut. The cave collapsed rubble on the other side prevented me from even cracking the door open. Somehow, while I slept, the darkness had taken me from my cell and put me where I could find it the nourishment it so craved.

Only later would I come to realize that the darkness had circumvented my barrier by moving me through its own realm instead of the normal dimension in which I lived. I would learn to harness that ability for my own needs in time, but this was the first time I had teleported.

The ramifications of this hit me immediately. I didn't know how the darkness had gotten me out of a fully sealed room, but knew if it could do that then there was no where on the whole planet I could go that this darkness could not drag me back from to find it a victim. There was nothing I could do; I had to give in and feed the darkness.

Now, three weeks to the day since I got this cursed life forced on me by the Peratovics, I stalked the streets and alleys of King's Row looking every bit as dark as the shadows I sought to feed.

A black leather trench-coat made a tiny whisper of sound as it moved about my calves when I walked. I could not feel the cold of the October night air, but the coat made it look like I was as uncomfortable as all the normal people on the street around me, and it allowed me to blend with the shadows in a normal everyday way that didn't require harnessing the dreaded darkness within me.

I turned down one ally and finally found what I was looking for. There in the dark and filthy back street stood one of the Vahzilok "surgeons" that abducted people off the streets of Paragon City.

The followers of Dr. Vahzilok are twisted medical men who believe that by harvesting the limbs and organs of the living they can perform transplants that will allow them to unlock the keys to immortality. They call themselves the 'Reapers' in their desire to think that they can control death and the one I found in the alley this night was typical of the Vahzilok followers in his appearance, with his long rubber gloves and gore stained apron as he waved a blood caked, rusted saw at the young woman he had trapped against the wall of the building.

"Think of it as early organ donation," the reaper laughed as he closed in on the woman.

I stepped further into the ally and smiled uneasily. I meant it to be intimidating, I knew that I was the one with the power here, but at the same time I was nervous about willingly stepping into danger and I was certain that nervousness showed despite my efforts to hide it. "I don't think she's interested in being quite that charitable today," I glared at the psychopath and, as he looked to see who had spoken, his intended victim slipped a little further out of his reach.

"Oh good. More is always better," The reaper smiled a yellow-toothed smile and took a step in my direction, "And I so love volunteers."

I let the darkness out and as I did I tried to will it into a form I had seen Skelter use once.

A tide of shadow erupted from both my hands and races along the asphalt of the alley towards the reaper. When it reached his feet it shot upwards in what looked like a dozen, four foot long, coal black octopus tentacles that wrapped around the reapers legs up to his waist.

The tentacles held him rooted to the spot on which he stood as they began to pull the life from him in tiny bits, piece by agonizing piece.

I turned my attention to the reaper's original target. "Run," I stated in a flat voice, keeping a careful control over my hunger. She stood there thanking me and trying to tell me how wonderful it was that I had come just in the nick of time. I simply repeated the one word command a second time.

"RUN," I snapped at her. I wasn't worried about losing to this idiot Vahzilok hurting her, I had him well under control, I was concerned about what I might do to her if the darkness got out of control while I was feeding it.

She seemed to get the message that time and ran out of the alley as quickly as possible.

I turned back towards the would-be predator that was now my prey just in time to feel the sting in my side.

He couldn't reach me with the saw he was carrying, my tendrils of darkness held him too far way for that, but I had forgotten that the Vahzilok often carried little one hand crossbows.

The poison was working quick, designed no to kill but to dull the senses and slow reflexes, leaving the mad doctor's victims completely at their nonexistent mercy. My head was reeling and I stumbled against a trash dumpster.

The tendrils I had summoned up dissolved into nothing and the reaper came at me, brandishing the poison bearing crossbow in one hand and that menacing, bloody saw in the other. I put both my hands up in a gesture meant to protect my face as the saw arced at me in a swing that might well have taken my head off at the neck, but the darkness within reacted to my desire for safety. It reached out and pulled life from the reaper in a way I hadn't done with it before. Rather than a slow siphoning of life force that I had grown accustomed to from the darkness, the shadows within me took a large bite of the reaper's life force and redirected it into aiding me rather than feeding itself.

I felt my head clearing and, as I reached down to pull the small crossbow bolt from my side, I saw the wound sealing itself shut.

I casually dropped the bolt to the ground and stepped towards the reaper, who in turn was beginning to cower. "What are you?" he stammered out.

I was now the type of monster I sought protection from when I joined the Skulls. I was less than human. I was a foul creature that stalked the night, feeding on the life energies of others.

Dana Carols was as good as dead, of that much Skelter had been correct. Sure I was still me, minus a few lost memories of my youth, but I was a completely different me. I was a hunter, not a timid girl trying to avoid being hunted.

"I am Beda," I said as I reached towards him, choosing to use the name Skelter had called me by that night I awoke to being the new me. As my hand closed on his neck his life began flowing into my body and I could see the veins in my arm bulge and turn black under the skin,

I was a monster, but there were at least two things left that I could control about being this thing I had become:

First: While I had come to understand that I needed to feed the darkness in me if I had any hope of keeping it in check, I could at least pick what my prey would be. If I was going to be forced into life as a monster then so be it, but I would be the monster that made all the other monsters in King's Row tremble in fear, and it would only be the other threats of the city that I would allow myself to feed on, like this reaper. Besides, it seemed as if the darkness found the stronger prey more satisfying anyways.

Second: I could control how much I took from my prey. I could feel that the darkness wanted to drain my victims dry and leave nothing but a lifeless husk behind me, but, as the reaper sank into unconsciousness, I reigned in the shadows by sheer force of will, much as I had done with Skelter. I would feed the beast within me, but I would NOT kill.

Instead I left the reaper tied by his smock to the bottom of a street light and made an anonymous call to Paragon Police.

I would be a beast in King's Row, but I would be a beast on MY terms.

*********

Little did I know at that time, that while I was learning to live with being one of King's Row's night monsters, elsewhere in the Row another monster was hunting me.

"What do you mean you can't find her?" Skelter screamed as he unleashed a torrent of darkness that sent one of the lower ranked Skulls against the hood of a nearby car, "I want her head on a spike for what she did to me. Do you understand?"

The gravedigger pulled himself off the car and staggered to stand up right while Skelter continues his tirade, "I don't know what hole she has crawled in to hide, but she can't go on without feeding for long. She has to surface eventually, and when she does we are going to be there. Am I making myself clear?"

"Yes sir," the gravedigger answered through a drop of blood at the corner of his mouth along with six of his fellows that stood by watching the exchange, then the all dispersed into the night in an effort to find information on where their former member might be.

Skelter stepped over to the car he had hurled the lower ranked Skull against and ran his hand over the dent the gravedigger's body had made in the hood.

He understood the constant hunger that came with the dark powers the Peratovic brothers granted their trusted bosses. He remembered trying to fight it at first, but that only lasted about five minutes before the darkness had ripped away enough of his soul that, rather than resist it, he embraced it for the power that it brought him.

What Skelter didn't understand was how the woman he now hunted could have resisted the lure of the darkness enough to attack him instead of the easy prey he had brought her. Nor could he understand how she was able to resist killing him when her surprise barrage had left him unconscious and helpless.

The Bone Daddy was curious about these things, but in the end he didn't consider them very relevant. The bottom line to Skelter was that he didn't stand for being knocked around like that by anyone. One way or another, he was going to find her, and he would take his revenge on her for that insult. Next time he wouldn't be caught off guard.

Skelter had his cell of the Skulls checking everywhere for attacks on people that held the trademark signs of a Bone Daddy attacks. It had been a fruitless three weeks, but Skelter knew she would have to strike eventually, and that when he found an attack that that showed the signs of harnessing darkness like he could, but wasn't a Skulls operation, then he would have his trail and the hunt could begin in earnest.


	3. Chapter 3: Confrontations

Beda's Tale: Part Three

By: Rachel DeFausse

Silently I moved from shadow to shadow, stalking the rooftops of King's Row like a panther in the branches of my own urban jungle, watching the streets and alleys below for my next prey.

I had learned that the darkness inside of me would do as I willed it, so long as I continued to act in its best interest, which is to say as long as I continued to keep it fed.

Tonight I was seeking to feed the darkness within, as I had come to do on a weekly basis, and I willed myself to be unseen. The darkness accommodated by cloaking me in shadows so that I could blend with the night around me. I had found that this particular use of the darkness was so effective that I could come within arms reach of all but the most perceptive of people and not be noticed.

As I reached the end of the roof I was on, I stepped out into the air beyond the ledge and willed myself onto the next rooftop. In an instant I was there, my foot fall completing the step onto the tarpaper roof of the next building. The only thing to mark what had happened was the cold chill down my spine that always accompanied teleporting. The darkness had opened two gateways to the abyss for me so that as I stepped through the first into the black void of horror that was the natural realm for the darkness, I just as quickly was stepping back into my own world through the second portal that was a mere inch from the first in the void. Even that split second crossing through the unnatural darkness that was the netherworld left goose bumps on my skin.

I came to the edge of this roof and stopped in my tracks. My ears picked up a sound from the alley beneath the new roof's edge and I peered over to see two men cornering a third man against the alley wall.

This was the way my nights had been once a week for the last two months since I took the reaper as my first prey. This means of finding targets had become my custom. I would stalk the roofs until I found an innocent citizen in danger, then I would feed on the attackers, leaving the unconscious criminals bound in public places for the police to find and deal with. Tonight I paused when I saw the two thugs that would be my next victims.

The first was tall, about six foot two I would estimate, and had blond hair. The other was shorter, little over five and a half feet and bald. As they stood there, threatening a man who but his hooded sweatshirt and sweat pants wasn't intelligent enough to realize that this wasn't the neighborhood for night jogging, I thought they should have been just two more punks to feed the darkness within me, but they weren't. These two were different, because I knew them.

Underneath their leather jackets and bone masks, these were men I had known when I was a member of the Skulls nearly three months ago. The tall one was Robert Grasse, Robbie to his friends. Robbie was a little slow witted and probably only became a Skull because of his buddy Carl, Carl being the shorter, bald, opportunistic one in the alley, who had joined the Skulls for the lure of easy money.

I fought with the darkness inside me. It wanted to feed, but this wasn't the same as the past times I had found prey to appease it. It was ironic that out of over half a dozen street crooks I had hunted to sate the hunger within me, these two were the only ones that wore masks, yet they were also the only ones that were not faceless strangers to me.

A part of me wanted to just turn and walk away, to find prey somewhere else that I hadn't played cards with on boredom filled nights, but I knew that it didn't really matter if I knew these men or not. In the long run, everyone I fed on had a story behind them, the fact that I knew the story that went with these two didn't make them less deserving than the others, nor did it justify leaving the man they were mugging to his fate in their hands.

I resolved myself with the decision and leapt off the building, willing myself to the ground.

The Gateway that carried me to the ground placed me right behind Robbie and Carl and the momentum of my jump took me through it straight into Carl's back, forcing him facedown beneath me and at my mercy.

I glared at Robbie, focusing the dark power through my eyes. He froze in fear, throwing his hands up to protect his face, as if not seeing me there would make me go away.

"Run," I growled to the would-be victim, never taking my eyes from the tall blonde man that was cowering before me. I had grown used to victims fleeing for their lives, I had even grown accustomed to the more annoying ones that insisted on thanking me for saving them rather than take the intelligent choice and get while the getting was good, but the response I got this time was far different than anytime I had hunted before.

"I don't think so," came a cold, calm response in a voice that was all too familiar, and then I felt the impact against my side as an unnaturally strong fist sent me flying the width off the alley to strike the stained brown bricks of the building on the other side.

The wind knocked briefly from my lungs, I stared up at the man I thought I had just saved as he drew down his hood to reveal the bone mask of the Skulls. Behind that mask were eyes filled with barely contained rage, eyes that had once looked at me across a shared mattress.

This had been a trap. The realization spurred in me the need to move and I staggered to my feet as Skelter removed the sweatshirt to allow his strong corded muscles the freedom of movement that the white tank top he wore beneath could provide.

I was dimly aware of Robbie and Carl running away from the scene. It seemed that they had done their duty in setting this trap and Carl had every plan to get himself and his tall partner out of the line of fire before Skelter fully unleashed on me.

"You've been predictable," Skelter chided me sarcastically as a bolt of darkness shot from his outstretched hand and impacted with my side. I gasped as it struck me. It wasn't the same as a physical blow; the dark powers bypassed the flesh and struck at the very core of a person's being.

He continued to gloat as I writhed against the dirty wall behind me, "You follow the same route every Friday night. Didn't you think I would figure that out by reading the reports of your attacks in the papers? Didn't you realize that my boys would eventually see you and report to me? I swear Dana, you could have at least made it a challenge."

My jaw tightened at the sound of him speaking my old name and I stood against the pain. "I'm not Dana anymore," I reminded him and myself as I released bolt after bolt of my own dark energies in an angry tirade, "You killed Dana, remember. You destroyed her the night you let them make me into this."

My bolts were flying aimlessly; my growing rage was preventing me from focusing the willpower I needed to strike my target. I did get lucky a few times though, and a couple of my blasts struck Skelter in the chest causing him to stagger a bit.

"I'm Beda now," I roared at him, never letting up on my assault, "You should know that, Skelter. It's the name you gave me when I woke as this thing that you helped turn me into."

Skelter seemed to smile as he recovered from the surprise of my attack, "We gave you power, Beda," he said the name in a mocking tone and his darkness began to focus about his fists in what can only be described as a black glow created by the absolute absence of light around his hands, "But you didn't stick around long enough to learn how to use it."

Skelter charged. His first punch barely missed my head, and the dark forces behind it were enough to put cracks in the bricks behind me, the second caught me in my stomach and would have knocked the air from me if my own dark power wasn't rising up to resist it.

I couldn't continue taking those kinds of hits for long though. Unfortunately, there wasn't much I could do with Skelter in front of me and the brick wall behind. I was trapped there just wishing for a way out.

I braced myself as Skelter's next blow came at me. He knew I was trapped and was throwing full force this time. Having seen my short lived burst of rebellion against him a moment ago, he no longer saw me as something to be played with, but as a threat to be put down as quickly as possible.

I willed myself behind Skelter and fell backwards through the portal I opened behind me and out the second on the opposite side of the alley. The dark punch that was meant to crush my skull, instead merely grazed my chin as I retreated through the tiny span of netherworld to cross the alley in the real world and a gap of about twenty feet.

As I reentered the alley from my teleport through the abyss, I dropped into a crouch and spun to face Skelter.

I had thought that he would have realized what I had done, but instead he stood there with his back to me, staring at the wall I had seemingly slipped through.

It suddenly occurred to me that Skelter didn't teleport like I did. The idea wouldn't have occurred to me if it hadn't been for that night the darkness had taken me out of the sealed chamber I had secluded myself in, and since Skelter didn't deny the darkness in him, and instead fed in willingly and regularly, he had never had cause to discover that ability.

Now that I had reversed sides of the alley with him; I could also see how Skelter hadn't noticed that my original entrance to the alley had been by teleporting. From this side of the alley, he wouldn't have been able to see my portal open behind Carl and Robbie. To Skelter it must have seemed that I had simply leapt from the shadows onto Carl's back.

I reached out towards Skelter with the hungering darkness that was still waiting inside me to be fed and drew out a portion of his life force with the simple gesture of clenching my fist.

Skelter's body tightened up against my attack and the energy I stole from him quickly began to mend the pain in my side as I used his vitality to heal myself.

He turned to face me across the width of the alley and I could see the shock in his eyes. I was beginning to recognize the limits of his abilities, and he was beginning to see that my limitations weren't necessarily the same as his. I don't think he realized anymore than I had, that the darkness inside us could manifest in different ways, and had assumed that I would only be able to use it in the same ways that he did.

Other than the occasional bolts of darkness that Skelter could throw, all of the ways he manifested his power required that he be in close proximity to his target. I figure that this was because he was used to preying on the defenseless that groveled at his feet and had only needed to harness ranged strikes to stop those who ran, while I had been stalking prey that was more experienced than I was and had automatically adapted to keeping them at a distance to avoid their weapons.

Now that I understood Skelter's limits, I was the one in control. He charged at me and I simply side stepped him through the abyss to appear behind him once more already poised to hurl my counter attacks from a safe distance.

He continued to hurl bolts of darkness and throw punches through the empty space I left behind and I continued to vanish, only to reappear and draw out a little more of his life energy before vanishing again.

The strategy was sound, but it had one major flaw, teleporting required me to expend energy faster than I could draw it from Skelter. Every relocation was as taxing as sprinting the distances between where I began and where I would end up, and as I continued to do this I found myself short of breath.

As I stepped out into the real world for the last time I staggered. I had pushed my body to the limits of its endurance and dropped to my knees, unable to even support my own weight. Across from me, Skelter leaned heavily on a dumpster for support. Behind his Skull mask, I could see the loathing in his eyes, but I had drained him of too much energy for him to take advantage of my weakened state.

It was during this lull in the fighting that I noticed the sound of rapidly approaching sirens as police cars pulled to a stop, blocking the end of the alley.

Alternating red and blue light bathed the scene of our dingy little battle ground and lent an even more ominous look to the expression of pure hate on Skelter's face.

"We aren't done with this," he growled as he turned towards the police with his hands raised and slowly walked forward to surrender. I knew him well enough to know that giving up to the police because the battle had left him too weak to resist would be a sharp blow to his pride. Skelter thrived on being the one in control, the one inspiring fear in others, to have to surrender that control would be a slap in the face, and that he was doing it because of my ability to fight him to a standstill would mean that he was likely to try taking it out on me if he could.

I followed him out of that alley with my hands raised as well. Unlike Skelter, I didn't feel any sense of wounded pride at being taken into custody. As the officer cuffed my hands behind my back and helped me into the back of the squad car I felt relieved in a way. I was off the streets now and wouldn't be a danger to people anymore. Perhaps they could even find a cure for this thing inside me. I didn't know what would happen, but I did know that I felt something deep inside that I hadn't felt in a long time….Hope.


	4. Chapter 4: Arrested Developments

Beda's Tale: Part Four

Rachel DeFausse

The interrogation room at the King's Row Police Department was nothing like what I had come to expect from the cop shows. I had seen the movie cops question people around big wood conference tables in huge rooms the size of small studio apartments. I'm sure that kind of setup was great for filming purposes with tons of room for dramatic pacing and characters going into huge Emmy winning emotional breakdowns. Heck, some police departments might even have big rooms like that in other places, but here in the under budgeted district of King's Row things weren't quite so well off.

If an average person had chosen to lie down on the floor and extended their arms over their head, they could probably have had their palms flat against one wall and the soles of their feet against the other.

Crammed in that small space were three metal folding chairs, and small folding table like the type people use for picnics, myself and the two officers who had come in to question me about the confrontation between myself and Skelter earlier that night.

I sat in one of the folding chairs. It turned out that the semi-parasitic darkness within me could protect me from heat and cold and heal me when needed, but even it couldn't find a way to make those stupid metal chairs comfortable. I must admit that the chaffing of the cuffs around my wrists and the equally unpleasant shackled bar on my ankles didn't help much either.

The first of the two detectives in the room with me had introduced himself as Detective Becktrees. He was a younger fellow, about my age, maybe a little older but probably still under thirty. The sleeves on his blue button-up shirt had been rolled to the elbows and when taken with red sneakers he wore seemed to indicate a casual attitude towards his job and probably life in general. Combined with his overly large smile and the steaming cup of coffee he had set on the table in front of me, I gathered that he would be playing the "good cop" of the pair when they questioned me.

If it hadn't been for my aforementioned resistance to the cold I probably would have been extremely eager for that coffee. I'm sure the room was chilly by most people's standards, and the officers that did the booking procedures had confiscated my trench-coat, but I had no need for the drink to warm me.

What I thirsted for was the life energy of the man who had offered it. I knew that I could have simply reached out and taken it, even with my hands cuffed, but I also knew that it wasn't truly my desire but the desire of the thing that was inside of me and I fought it down by sheer force of will.

While Becktress was the obvious "good cop" I couldn't really label the other detective as a "bad cop". He had introduced himself as Detective Freitag and the tone of his voice clearly went with his no nonsense, navy blue suit. He set his fedora on the corner of the table as he had walked in and, bypassing the remaining chair, had chosen to stand with his back to the far corner by the door and eye me like a poker player looking for a tell in his opponent.

No, I couldn't call him the "bad cop", that would infer an edge that this Freitag fellow just didn't have. I thought of him more as the "responsible cop" or the "business cop", or, (and this was the nickname that finally stuck in my mind but I decided not to let reach my lips) "Detective Killjoy".

"Well, Beda," Detective Becktress grinned and seemed to put an emphasis on the name I had given the booking clerk that told me he knew it wasn't my real name and he was humoring me, "Care to tell us what was going on in that alley earlier tonight?"

"Not particularly," I smiled back at him and took a mannerism as if I were a guest at a social gathering rather than a cuffed prisoner, "At least not until we negotiate what I get in exchange for my cooperation."

Becktrees seemed surprised by my response, but his partner, Freitag merely raised an eyebrow. "I don't think you understand the situation ma'am," Freitag offered in a voice and tone that seemed to belong more to the days of the old Humphrey Bogart movies, "You aren't being charged with anything at the moment. There isn't anything to negotiate until we know what happened."

"I'm not being charged?" My lack of cooperation had been a surprise to the two detectives, but not nearly as large a shock as theirs was to me.

"Not unless there is something you should be charged for," Becktrees smiled, "At the moment, we might be looking at disturbing the peace and a little vandalism at the worst."

"Your buddy, Skelter, lawyered up on us and refuses to talk. That gives you a crack at being the first to tell us what happened," added Freitag from his corner of the room.

"Skelter isn't my 'Buddy' by a long shot," I spat back at him before I realized I was saying it. With a sigh I settled my self back into a sense of composure and decided how much I wanted to tell the police. I had surrendered peacefully in order to get help, and was planning on negotiating a confession and testifying against Skelter into getting that help, but now that I had been told how minor the charges were against me, I realized that I really didn't have much to lose, or much to bargain with.

I began telling them my story in the hope that by being cooperative now I could still get them to find me help in putting an end to this curse that had been haunting me for so long.

I left out the parts about my personal role in the illegal activities of the Skulls while I was a part of them and concentrated instead on Skelter's actions.

When I got to the part about the ceremony that the Petrovics had used to put the darkness in me I was surprised to discover how much it still hurt to remember. Inside I was in nearly hysterical tears, while outside I was certain nothing showed. The darkness in me wasn't about to allow the weakness of emotion to show through, unless it was as a ploy to lure in prey, I'm sure it could have managed a few alligator tears to get itself fed if it had to.

I also told them about my break with Skelter and how I had been feeding the darkness since then. I told them about the way I would chose my prey from those who were attacking the residents of King's Row and how I was careful not to take to much from them when the darkness in me fed.

Finally I ended with the events from earlier that evening and the trap that Skelter had set for me.

Through out all of it the two detectives simply listened to my story, only occasionally asking prompting questions to get more detail. Then, as I finished, Becktrees looked to his partner and Freitag simply nodded, as if in answer to a silent question between them.

"I'll be right back," Becktress told me as he stood and walked out the door, leaving me alone with his partner. I sighed slightly and hoped that I wouldn't be waiting too long for his return.

It was at that point that I got my next big surprise in a night that seemed to have a never ending supply of them. Freitag produced a set of keys from his pocket and unlocked my ankle shackles and then the cuffs at my wrists before returning to his spot in the corner without explanation.

It wasn't long before Becktrees came back in and set a manila folder in front of me. I opened the folder with tentative fingers, unsure what would be in it and found it contained reports and news clippings of the people I had fed on since I started hunting the criminals of King's Row.

I skimmed a few of the articles. "Mystery Hero Stops Circle of Thorns Abduction" and "Unknown Protector Strikes Again" were a couple of the headlines about my night time exploits, and I was stunned by what I was seeing. I hadn't read a paper or watched the news on television in a long time. It had never occurred to me that the people of King's Row would see me, not as another monster stalking the shadows of their streets, but as a hero that protected them from the maniacs that I had grow up fearing.

As my mind processed what had been in the folder, I could hear Becktrees talking to me. "We knew you were out there," he said with what was probably his most reassuring smile, "You've done a lot to help protect the people of King's Row over the last few weeks."

"We suspected you were the vigilante hero that has been saving people when you were brought in," Freitag added, "We just needed to hear what you had to say to help us get the facts straight about who you are and what you've been doing."

"I don't understand," I admitted to the detectives as I gestured towards the folder full of information about me, "If you already _know_ I'm the one doing these things, why aren't you arresting me?"

"Have you ever heard of the Citizen Crime Fighting Act?" Becktrees asked and, as I shook my head that I didn't, Freitag began to explain it to me.

"In 1937 the Citizen Crime Fighting Act was passed in an effort to give people with extraordinary abilities the opportunity to aid law enforcement. As long as you follow police guidelines and aren't violating the rights of the people you are bringing in, you are well within your rights to continue protecting the people of King's Row."

I couldn't believe my ears. I was sitting in the King's Row police station, infested with a semi-intelligent thing that saw every living person around me as a potential meal, and instead of locking me away somewhere to keep the public safe, these cops wanted to recruit me and sic me on the local criminals like some sort of trained attack dog.

"You don't get it, do you?" I snapped at the detective, "I'm not out there protecting anyone. I've been feeding a parasite inside of me. I'm not a hero. I'm one of the bad guys, and I want this thing out of me. I'm one of the monsters in the night, not some sort of hero." The darkness in me was welling up. It was tempting me to let it out for a little taste of the overly serious cop by the door. Part of me thought that if Freitag felt first hand what it was I did to people perhaps he wouldn't be so eager to suggest turning me lose on the people of King's Row.

I fought the feeling back, but made sure my tone of voice left no question to just how angry I was that these two cops seemed so eager to use me as their loaded gun against crime in the Row.

"You aren't one of the monsters," Becktrees said as his hand moved across the table to rest on the back of mine. He was making an attempt to reassure and calm me, but lost the intended result almost completely when he flinched ever so slightly at the cold touch of my skin.

Still he left his hand there despite his uneasiness and he still kept that smile plastered to his face. Maybe he wouldn't have if he had realized that the coldness of the touch was the darkness in me sipping at the traces of life energy being released with his own body heat. "What's in you is no doubt a heavy burden to bear, but you have control of it. You help people and you don't take lives. The fact that you do it in spite of this thing trying to push you over the edge makes you more of a hero, not less of one."

"We know some people Ms. Beda," Freitag interjected, "We can put in a few calls and see if there is someone out there that can help you get rid of this thing. For now, however, you need to face the fact that you have this power and decide what you want to do with it. Do you want to sit around waiting for a cure, or do you want to use it to make King's Row a safer place for as long as you have it?"

"It's your choice," Becktrees continued off of his partner's speech, "We will try to get you help one way or the other. If you're willing to help us, you could make a real difference, but if you don't want to we understand and will still ask around to get you the help you want. Linda might have something useful." The last part seemed more directed towards Frietag than me but something seemed to click when I heard the name.

I reopened the file that Becktrees had shown me and noticed about half the articles had been written by a woman named Linda Summers and presumed this was who they were talking about.

Freitag seemed to notice my connecting the dots and voiced the connection I was seeing with a little additional information. "Mrs. Summers is a reporter," He stated in the same no-nonsense tone he had been using throughout the evening, "She specializes in gang activity here in King's Row and has been doing some in depth coverage of the Skulls. The similarity of your abilities to those of Skull leaders like Skelter piqued her interest and she's been following your activities as close as anyone."

"Her familiarity with the Skulls operations might mean that she knows something about your condition," Becktrees offered, "Or at least that she might have a contact who does. We will get in touch with her for you."

"Even if I don't agree to play hero for you?" I asked incredulously.

"Even if you don't play hero," Becktrees agreed.

I think that it was the fact that the detectives were offering me the alternative of not working with them that actually convinced me I was willing to help. I had been intimidated by the crooks in King's Row and ordered around for so long that being handed a choice and asked for help was a refreshing and liberating change.

"Alright," I nodded to Becktrees, "I'll be a hero on the streets for you, but I have a couple conditions."

"We're listening," Becktrees nodded.

"First: You swear you're going to do everything you can to help me get this thing out of me," I insisted.

"Everything we _legally_ can," Frietag agreed with an emphasis that they weren't going to cross the line in their attempts to help me. I could respect that. Goodness knows I had lines I was being careful not to cross.

I acknowledged his amendment of my demand with a nod and continued, "Second: I want work alone. I don't want any innocents nearby if I lose control of this thing." The darkness was a hard thing to keep in check. The best explanation I could think of was a recovering alcoholic celebrating six months sober by going to Oktoberfest, except that would probably even pale in comparison to the urges I had to fight back.

Worst of all, if the alcoholic fell off the wagon he got a hang over, if I fell off someone could get seriously hurt, if not killed, and really didn't want to have some poor cop standing next to if the darkness decided it was time to reach for that open bottle.

"Fair enough," Becktrees agreed, "We might ask you to work with a partner or a team once in a while but you will always have the option of saying no if you don't feel comfortable with what we ask."

I didn't like that one. On the surface it looked like they were saying yes to my condition, but I knew that if they had something come up that required me to work with another person I wouldn't be able to really say no without feeling guilty that I could have helped keep someone safe. Heck, what if I said no and the person I was asked to work with got hurt, or killed, because they went it alone?

I agreed anyways. I was setting conditions, but the truth was, if these guys could help me find a cure for this thing I wasn't really in a position to be overly picky about what they were asking in return.

"Third," I said and paused for a moment. I knew what I was about to say was going to be a bit over the top and melodramatic, but I felt it was necessary; "This thing inside me is constantly fighting for control. If it ever takes over and I lose it, you guys put me down before somebody gets hurt."

Becktress was stunned. He was jolted by the surprise of the last condition so much that I thought he was going to fall out of his chair.

Frietag, on the other hand, seemed unfazed. "Agreed," he stated flatly and I knew that if it came to stopping me or risking innocent lives he wouldn't hesitate to pull the trigger for the greater good.

I might not have liked Frietag, he certainly wasn't a guy I would invite to a party, but I could tell when the chips were down he would do what it took and I could depend on him to make the hard choice.

Bectrees regained his composure enough to slide a small device across the table to me. It was a little larger than a deck of cards and had a wire leading out to one of those little earpiece things that jogger's sometimes wear, the kind that you actually put in your ear like a hearing aid.

"Police band radio," He explained, "Microphone built in. You'll be able to hear when we need help and what's going on where. In addition, if you make an arrest you can call it in and we'll send out a car to pick up your suspects. I'll be your contact in the department"

"No," I stated flatly as I took the portable radio from the table. I saw how the two reacted to the idea of having to stop me if the darkness ever gained control, something I considered a very real and _extremely_ frightening possibility. Becktrees didn't have what it took to stop me if it came down to it and I couldn't take the chance that he might get all sympathetic and go easy should things take a bad turn.

I gestured towards Freitag, "I want to work with Detective Killjoy there."

Frietag nodded back and I could tell he wasn't just agreeing to work with me, he was acknowledging the unspoken agreement that he would be there to handle business if I lost it.


	5. Chapter 5: Darkened Dreams

Beda's Tale: Part Five

By: Rachel DeFausse

I don't have to sleep often, a few hours a week can get me by, but I dread the times that I do. My dreams are always nightmares and those nightmares are always the same.

In my nightmares I still see that Hellion on the street, the one from about a year and a half ago now. Each time I walk towards him, each time he laughs at me and make a lewd comment, and each time I watch the horrified shock in his expression as I kill him.

I feel the knife sink through his skin and the warm, wet feel of his blood on my hands as he slumps down towards the pavement. I watch the light fade from his eyes. After what seems like an eternity he slips into death with one last gasp, but this does not end the nightmare.

The Hellion's open, gasping mouth widens. Inside is a pitch black darkness that suddenly erupts as it spews forth creatures that seemed to have been born in the depths of Hell itself. The same horrific fiends that I saw during the ritual that made me into the darkness possessed thing I now am.

And then I wake.

When I was normal woman I had waken from my nightmares in a cold sweat with tears of guilt pouring down my cheeks. That had been from nightmares of the Hellion I had killed, before I had been subjected to the added horrors that came with knowing that those demonic things were real and not only out there in the world some where, but that one had taken root inside of my own mind.

Now I can only cry on the inside. The thing that has become a part of me and haunted my existence for the last seven months or so won't allow my body to show a weakness like emotion, unless it's using the emotion as bait for potential prey. Instead I am forced to feel all the guilt tearing at me on the inside without any means of release other than to hunt the King's Row night and use this hellish thing in me to do some good and try to make up for the wrong that I had done before.

As I said, that is the way my few nights of sleep always went, until now at least.

This dream was different and I would not have bothered, or had the courage, to speak of my usual torturous nights if it were not needed to establish just how out of the normal this dream was.

At first I didn't even know I was asleep. I remembered feeling tired and the dread that always came with the knowledge that I would soon be forced to succumb to sleep. I had debated at one point taking medication to help me stay awake, but I knew that doing so would only put off the inevitable, and I worried even more that fatigue from not getting those scant moments of rest would cause me to possibly loose my tenuous hold on the dark thing that lay in wait within me.

I lay on the sofa, staring at the ceiling for about an hour in the one room apartment I had come to afford from the "consultant" fees that Freitag gave me when I helped the police on a case. I could probably have afforded a couch that pulled out into a bed if I wanted to, but since I rarely sleep, I didn't see the point in spending the extra money it would have taken.

I had finally given up on sleeping and stood to get an orange soda from the mini-fridge I had bought.

I no longer had to eat or drink, in fact whenever I had tried to eat the darkness in me had caused the food to rot as it reached my lips. It seemed that the darkness ate away at what was once living and as a result meat, bread, fruit juice and any other natural food or drink made from once living animals and plants was beyond my ability to stomach. I had eventually found a way around this to some extent.

Sodas, as long as they were artificially flavored, were vastly chemical creations with little in it being organic other than the sugars and as such I was able to drink it with only a slight aftertaste. Orange soda had always been my favorite and for some reason I found the flavor comforting. It was sort of a reminder of simpler times when I was younger.

I got my soda and took a seat at the small table by the window. The table was a tiny thing, only about two and a half foot square with a tiled top, but had come with two chairs that were high set like barstool, yet had backs built onto them for support. I didn't have people over, and the second chair had never been used, but having it there offered me a hope that one day I could be normal again and have company to sit and talk to without the need to fight back a desire to suck the life from their body as a meal for the darkness within.

The fact that nobody had ever used that chair made it doubly shocking when I lowered the soda bottle from my lips to find it occupied. Not only was someone sitting there, that someone was me.

Well she was sort of me anyways. Same face, same build, same hairstyle, same motions as she lowered its own soda bottle to the table in a mirror of my own movement, but it wasn't me.

The "me" sitting across from the real me was like the negative of a photograph. It was as if someone had gathered the shadows of the wall and crafted them into a statue of an idealized me then given it life.

"Hello, Dana," The shadow me smiled as it set its own shadowy bottle on the table and relaxed back in its chair with an aura of superiority. It's smile was playful but in the same way a cat is "playful" with a mouse, and its voice oozed venom in its polite tone as if the shadow me were hiding a desire to rip my head off with an overdone pleasantness.

"My name is Beda," I stammered. I had not gone by my birth name in what seemed like an eternity. I was surprised to find my vice was shaky. Such signs of weakness had been subjugated by the darkness that had taken root in me since the ritual the leaders of the Skulls had put me through.

"No little girl," The shadow me laughed in a condescending way, "You are Dana Carols. I am Beda."

It was then that I realized that this was the dark thing inside of me that had been making my life a living hell for months. My body stopped trembling with fear and began to tremble instead with rage.

I threw my half empty bottle of orange soda at the shadow me and watch her body ripple like dark water as it passed through and crashed against the far wall.

"Now, now," Shadow me chided as if I she were my mother and I were a child being rude, "Is that anyway to treat a guest?"

"You're no guest of mine," I snapped. The months of frustration at being host to this thing finally had a target it could be unleashed at, "You're that thing inside that makes me want to hurt the people around me and I want you OUT!"

I extended my hand in a reflexive gesture to hurl a bolt of darkness at the shadow me, but this did nothing other than make shadow me roll her eyes. At least I assume that was what she did by the facial expression, it's hard to tell when her eyes were as solid black as the rest of her and had no pupils to track the motion with.

"Ah, but I am a guest, Dana," Shadow me smiled, "You invited me in when you agreed to take part in the dark ritual that the Petrovic brothers performed. Granted, you tried to take back that invitation part way through, but once you invite me in, I am in and that is all there is to it."

"You might be in," I growled. I had held this thing at bay inside of me for months on end and that fact gave me back a little bit of comfort and security in my position while dealing with her. "But I'm the one in control."

"You keep thinking that," Shadow me smiled, and I could see that even her teeth were made of the same inky shadow substance. Through the smile I could see that some of her confidence had waned, her posture was less relaxed in the chair and I knew that I had hit a nerve with reminding her that I was the one in charge, "For now you are the dominate personality, but in time you should weaken and I should gain control."

Shadow me took a sip from the shadow formed imitation of my soda bottle that she had been holding, "Now can we get down to business while we still have time?"

"What are you talking about?" I asked warily.

"I don't have a hold on your conscious mind yet, my dear," Shadow me sighed, "I have had to make do with influencing you through the subconscious. I have had to fuel your own desires and hungers rather than be able to act on my own. I am growing stronger within you, but I still do not have enough of a hold to communicate with you while you are conscious and if I am to deal with you at al, it must be now before you wake."

"Then this is a dream?" I asked, but even as I did so I realized the truth of it. The room had a dream like quality, where details were faded and nothing seemed to fully exist outside of whatever I was directly focusing on.

"In a way," Shadow me shrugged, "Sort of half way between a dream, and a hallucination, but I don't have time to get into the metaphysical properties involved. I am here seeking a truce."

"Why?' I spat at her, "Worried you are going to lose? Afraid that I won't weaken and you won't be able to take over?"

"There is a slight possibility of that," Shadow me conceded grudgingly and gave me a cold glare of anger, "Unfortunately one of the properties of this realm is that thoughts become reality and it becomes nearly impossible to lie, unless of course you are convinced that your lie is in fact the truth."

"Really?" I smiled now. I had gotten the best of shadow me on this one. I had made her admit her own concern that she wouldn't be able to take me over completely. That realization made me also realize the way she had chosen her words before, she had said I "should" weaken and she "should" take control not that either case were a definite, only that they were possibilities.

"Yes," Shadow me nodded, then the grin returned to her face, "Perhaps a demonstration. Are you afraid that I will take over and run free of you thin control over me?"

"Absolutely terrified," the words sprung from my mind to my lips before I had a chance to filter them and shadow me gave a grin as she turned the tables on me and regained control of the conversation.

"I assume you came here for a reason," I glowered across the table. I understood her anger when I had got her to admit what she didn't want to admit. People are quick to grudge all lying as bad, but at the same time, to be forced lay the truth out there can cause some serious handicaps, especially when dealing with people, or in this case strange demonic shadow things, that you don't like to begin with.

"I did indeed," Shadow me smiled and leaned forward on the table and filched me a solid black Cheshire-Cat smile, "As I mentioned, I am here to propose a truce."

"What kind of truce?" I asked skeptically. On the one hand I felt uncomfortable dealing with this thing, it was evil and to deal with it felt like negotiating with the devil himself.

"We both want the same thing," Shadow me smiled. Her tone had quickly shifted from condescending to empathetic, but I mentally steeled myself against her false-friend ploy, "You want me out of your mind, and I want out of it as well. Nobody, in hundreds of years, has ever fought me as much as you do. Nobody has ever held control of me nearly as long."

"Fifteen hundred years ago I was a terror to behold," Shadow me boasted, "I followed men onto the fields of battle and took the souls of the fallen to feed my needs. I was heralded as a goddess of funerals and death. Prisoners were sacrificed in my name simply to appease me so I wouldn't turn on the villages at large."

"I want my freedom again," Shadow me slapped the palm of one shadowy hand on the table, "I am tired of waiting on your Good Samaritan acts to feed me while I starve inside of you. I would rather return to the abyss until some other calls to me than to remain here in servitude, chained in the depths of your mind, waiting for the scraps of soul you deem fit to toss me as if I were some mangy hound at a dinner table."

I was shocked. The darkness I had inside of me had just told me that it wanted to be rid of me as much as I wanted to be rid of it.

"I want free," shadow me growled, then sat back with a sigh, "I have little doubt that in time I will dominate you, but that could take years with the way you resist me and for one that had been a goddess, every day as a prisoner in your mind is an insult I am loathe to abide."

"Very well," I nodded to the shadow me, "I want you gone, you want to be gone, the solution seems obvious, go away." I gave a gesture with my hand towards her as I said it as if shooing of a stray cat. My movements were not as graceful as hers, but I felt the gesture's implied dismissal and insult was worth it.

"I would if I could," Shadow me grumbled, "The magic that binds us is something that neither you nor I can undo, but the opportunity will come to us sooner than you might think."

"You will be brought to a mage soon," Shadow me explained, "I have seen it, and I know that he is the one that will be able to free us from one another. He isn't much now, hardly trained at all but he has two things we need, knowledge of how to find the spells to release us from each other, and the innate power to work those spells. You must find a way to work with him if we are to be separate again, but it will not be easy."

"How will I know when I find him?" I asked. The promise of a chance to be rid of the darkness was being dangled in front of me and I mentally chided myself at being so willing to jump at the bait without knowing for certain if this were some sort of trap or not.

"You have met him once before and you will recognize him again," Shadow me began to fade and as her voice faded with her image I could hear my phone ringing from across the room, "You will know him when you see him again."

I woke to the sound of the phone and sat up from the couch to answer it.

"Beda?" The voice from the other end was female and I recognized it as belonging to Linda Summers, a journalist that Detective Frietag had introduced me to. In exchange for some inside info on the Skulls she had promised to look into possible cures for my condition. That had been a month and a half ago.

"What can I do for you Mrs. Summers?" I asked fully expecting more questions about the workings of the gang to which I had previously belonged.

"Actually," the reporter replied, "It's what I can do for you. I think I found someone who might be able to offer some help with your condition. Meet me over by Crowne Memorial, and bring one of those sausage muffin things and a cup of coffee if you could. You might not have to eat, but I am starving here."

"No problem. I'll be there right after I clean up here a little. And thank you Linda," I set the receiver down on its base as I eyes the broken bottle and puddle orange soda on the floor.


End file.
